In his lecture, Johnson will explore how systems with seemingly identical starting conditions lead to remarkably different outcomes and how these and other real-world systems exhibit the earmarks of a phenomenon called “chaos.”

According to Johnson, “We will explore a classic example of a chaotic system that appears quite benign yet displays all of the rich, underlying complexity of chaotic motion.”

Some of the areas of Johnson’s lecture were developed during communications research he did while at the Naval Research Lab in Washington, D.C.